


it will be alright, alright, alright

by heistpost



Category: TOMORROW X TOGETHER | TXT (Korea Band)
Genre: Chemistry Teacher Soobin, M/M, Magic Realism, Single Dad Yeonjun, baby beomgyu!!!, baby hyuka!!, baby taehyun!!, changbin and mark make appearances in passing bc theyre all canonically friends bc i said so, not quite they're in high school, yes it is in fact featuring dilf yeonjun, you are most welcome
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-27
Updated: 2020-12-27
Packaged: 2021-03-10 20:55:10
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,293
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28123452
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/heistpost/pseuds/heistpost
Summary: "Kai is a teenager. Teenagers do stuff like this all the time," Mr. Choi Soobin says after telling him about how Kai blows up his Chemistry lab, laughing it off with a dismissive hand that shouldn't be as slack and lax as it is. “Explode. They do that.”"Not blow up an entire chemistry lab!" Yeonjun fumes."No, it's fine, really," the teacher says, with the sweetest smile this time. "He's really cute."That's new. Nobody would ever call someone cute after they blow up something.
Relationships: Choi Soobin/Choi Yeonjun
Comments: 7
Kudos: 137
Collections: TXT Secret Santa Fic Fest 2020





	it will be alright, alright, alright

**Author's Note:**

  * For [retrofaery](https://archiveofourown.org/users/retrofaery/gifts).



> yes, yes it is Indeed dilf yeonjun. my writer's brain is the biggest of you alls. 
> 
> happy holidays everyone!! this one is for my lovely writer, i do hope you enjoy this little piece i managed to put together in such a short time despite me changing a few things up to better suit the plot i had in mind >___< hope you have a wonderful year ahead of you! <3
> 
> title taken from _can't we just leave the monster alive ___
> 
> _  
> _*slides you a fic about the process of remedying subpar parenting of a magical child due to residual adolescent emotional baggage* enjoy!_  
> _

It's the first call of the semester and probably not the last. 

Yeonjun is just getting off work when his phone vibrates in his chest pocket, shaking him out of his stressful post-meeting state by the vending machine with just a few words from Kai's homeroom teacher, telling him about an incident Yeonjun already knows what before he tells him. 

"Everything's fine, Mr. Choi," the teacher says with what Yeonjun can tell is his best soothing voice. "Kai is fine. Fortunately, no one was hurt. I just need you to come down to pick him up."

Yeonjun dashes out into the chilly autumn air and into his car, almost tempted to run all red lights on his way. He gets off at Kai's school parking lot, and he sees his son playing basketball by himself on the court with another adult playfully laughing at his misses. Kai sticks his tongue out at the man, posing to shoot another hoop when he catches sight of his dad, standing a few meters off the court from him. He stops, mirth gone from his face. 

Yeonjun gives him a weak smile. 

"Oh, Kai! Your dad is here." The man approaches him with a smile. "Hello, I'm Kai's homeroom and Chemistry teacher Choi Soobin." Soobin bows, Yeonjun bows back. The sun hasn't quite set yet, licking everything in a yellowish orange shade of light. He towers over Yeonjun by a few inches and wears a face of someone who shouldn't. Droopy eyes yet an earnest quirk of his mouth when he speaks. Full cheeks. He looks too young to be a high school teacher.

“Ah, Kai.” Soobin beckons him over but he doesn't move an inch from where he stands. From there, Yeonjun could make out his downcast eyes, glaring at his soot-covered white sneakers. 

“He’s fine. He just...” _doesn’t like me._ Yeonjun sighs.

"Kai," Soobin calls again and Kai's eyes suddenly soften, almost guilty yet still avoiding eye contact with any of them.

Yeonjun frowns.

The teacher smiles at him apologetically. "Thank you for coming, Mr. Choi Yeonjun, right? Shall we talk?"

It's not the first time Kai has set something on fire. Growing up, he had developed a strange fascination towards fire, paying the same amount of careful yet intense attention to both fiery tendrils of a bonfire and the soft flicker of candle lights. His fascination sometimes urges him to reach out and touch the flames, just to see what it’s like, how it feels, to satisfy his raw curiosity. Yeonjun is always there to flick his hand away every time and to tell him burns hurt for a long time.

At home, Yeonjun had made sure to keep matches and lighters out of his reach and yet somehow Kai always ends up sitting or standing before flames of unexplained origin, seeing as there isn’t any matches or any form of kindling in the first place. Kai’s parents chalk it up to something they somehow missed, even if they’re both unsure what, because it’s the only explanation that made sense.

Certainly not that Kai magically _made_ fire. That’s not logical. That’s impossible.

It’s not the first time Kai has set something on fire, however he did it, Yeonjun tells Soobin when the teacher asked. But it is the first time he did so without his mom to hold him through tantrums, when he feels more stubborn and even more curious, without his mom to extinguish the fire, to tell him everything's fine.

To do all things Yeonjun couldn't do himself. 

Yeonjun sits there, a little bit more lost than he’d like to be in front of a stranger who thinks he can talk him with small talk about how orange the sunset is. Kai carries on shooting hoops not too far from them, the sound of the ball bouncing on the court thumping against Yeonjun’s skull.

"Kai is a teenager. Teenagers do stuff like this all the time," Mr. Choi Soobin says after telling him about how Kai blows up his Chemistry lab, laughing it off with a dismissive hand that shouldn't be as slack and lax as it is. “Explode. They do that.”

"Not blow up an entire chemistry lab!" Yeonjun fumes. 

"No, it's fine, really," the teacher says, with the sweetest smile this time. "He's really cute." 

That's new. Nobody would ever call someone cute after they blow up something.

"I apologize. I’ll pay for the damages. Where...”

"It's that room up there." Soobin points at the building in front of them on the second floor where the dying rays of the orange sun bounce off the completely normal glass window. Didn't look like it was damaged in any way. Didn't look like it got blown up. 

"Luckily, I can rewind time by a few minutes so the clean-up wasn't that hard," Soobin narrates with a certain bounce in his voice. Like they're sharing a secret between them only they know about. "Most of the students are gone by the time of the explosion, you know, being the weekend and all. Kids are too eager to go to karaoke rooms and hang out.”

"You can... _what?"_

“Hmm? Oh.” Soobin allows him a few minutes to process, "My ability. I can rewind time so any damage to the lab has been... oh my god. You don't know what I'm talking about."

"What do you mean you can rewind _time?"_

Soobin blinks at him. "Oh, this is going to take time to explain then." He hums under his breath, looking over at Kai one more time with just a little hint of a smile when Kai misses a hoop and starts chasing the ball he accidentally kicked with his foot.

Yeonjun feels the fatigue throbbing inside his head. “Mr. Choi.”

“Oh, you can call me Soobin.”

 _“Mr. Choi,_ I thought we are being serious here. My son blew up your lab and now you’re talking about...”

"What do you say we talk about this over dinner, Mr. Choi?" Soobin asks, standing up. "There's a lot to talk about but it might be the best for all parties involved if we get something inside our stomachs first." 

The protest gets caught in his throat when Soobin hollers at Kai and tells him they could eat dinner together. He swallows it when his son whoops in excitement, as if Soobin just told him he could come with him to Lotte World.

Soobin leads them to a _samgyupsal_ place and starts ordering plate after plate of meat. Yeonjun is just starting to mentally calculate the total cost of everything on the table including the ones on the way when Mr. Choi beats him to it, already on his feet, "It's on me, Mr. Choi" and leaves before said he can even begin to protest. He comes back with two cans of beer and an apologetic look on his face when he catches Yeonjun's indecipherable face.

"I hope I wasn't being too forward or anything, Mr. Choi. The owner of this place is a close friend of my mom's, who also coincidentally owes her a few thousand won _._ So, it's fine." 

Yeonjun passes a look over at the counter and finds the said owner looking fondly at their table. She gives him an excited wave, Yeonjun smiles and bows at her. "That's fine, then. Thank you, Mr. Choi."

Soobin smiles at him. Kai snorts at the side. "Quit calling each other Mr. Choi."

"Ohh," Soobin chirps, makes a circle finger gesture at everyone around the table. "A trio of Chois in a table. It can get a little confusing. In that case... your father can call me Soobin, then."

When Yeonjun looks up at him, he sees his small smile at the corner of his lips.

"Can _I_ call you Soobin?"

"Don't you think that's a little disrespectful?"

Kai scrunches his face. "You let me call you _hyung,_ once."

" _Kai,"_ comes Yeonjun's warning. Kai shrinks in his seat, pouting a little. "That's your teacher. Tsk, look at you pouting like a kid. You’re a highschooler.”

The pout vanishes and the mood quickly drops at their table. Soobin licks his lips and nudges at Kai’s side. “I could go for ice cream after this. You really should treat me for the trouble today.”

Kai groans playfully. “You’re eating up my pocket money!”

“ _You’re_ eating up mine every time you ask me to buy you ice cream!”

“Well, it’s not _my_ fault you gave in so easily!”

Yeonjun watches this with a heavy stomach, busying himself instead with the grill. He notices how greasy his hands become so he excuses himself to the bathroom and washes his hands at least ten times before finally going back.

After dinner, they walk back towards the school with ice cream in hand and Kai trudging down the sidewalk a few meters ahead of them. This time, Yeonjun has paid for their ice cream successfully when he insisted, buying himself some beer cans with them.

They talk about Kai.

Soobin stumbles on his words sometimes when he talks, Yeonjun notices while nodding along to what he says. But there is eloquence to the way he talks about Kai, a degree of certainty, with cheer and affection laced in every word. He talks about him with the knowing of a father to his child, playful jabs at his quirks and tendencies, tones of pride at his talents and skills.

It was clear Kai shared the same sentiment as Soobin, the way he looks at him over his shoulder every few steps. They might be a little close, judging from the way he joked around with his teacher during dinner, the way he stuck his tongue out to him at the court a few hours ago and the laughing...

Yeonjun doesn’t like this. Yeonjun doesn’t like how Soobin and Kai’s bond has been rubbed on his face from the start. Doesn’t like how Soobin speaks of Kai with the ease Yeonjun couldn’t. Soobin’s earnestness and adoration hits like condescension on Yeonjun. Like he’s gloating about something he did that Yeonjun couldn’t do within close proximity, _being the father._ His simple knowledge of Kai’s likes and dislikes is like a big, fat punch to his face. 

Unmindfully, his answers to Soobin’s questions about how old he was when he had Kai, (“18. In America.”) and about his attitude at home (“Distant.”) become short and clipped. Kai looks at them as if detecting the weighing tension between the two.

Soobin must’ve picked up on it and hums under his breath, “Let’s talk about his gift.”

That’s what they do. Soobin explains about the existence and rarity of magic in reality. He tells him about gifts and how harmless and functional they could be with enough patience and practice. Constant honing. Achieving mastery. Soobin explains how it could vary from one person to another, how such gift could possibly affect their personality and vice versa over time. There are elemental gifts: air, water, earth, fire, lightning, and then there’s _natural_ gifts: gravity and time. Like his.

It’s not too grand of an ability, Soobin clarifies, chuckling over the same misunderstanding between he and Kai the first time he told him about his gift. “I assure you all of time and space continuum is safe from me. I can rewind a few minutes of _non-living_ objects. It does come in handy when you break your favorite mug or accidentally break your glasses. Your son thought I could time travel and stuff.”

Yeonjun couldn’t say he did _not_ think of that, too.

Soobin tells him Kai’s gift is a variety of a fire gift. Suddenly, everything about Kai’s fascination with fire makes sense. Yeonjun divulges about the flames of Kai’s childhood, about how it always bothered him how as much as Kai likes the fire, it never really burned him before.

“It’s part of his gift,” Soobin says, with a hint of pride. Again. “Fire resistance. He would make a very good firefighter.” 

And Yeonjun takes all of it well. Better than he would imagine learning about magic in the modern age, but it might’ve been to his previous exposure to superstitions that come true, or that it's not hard to believe Kai has the innate tendency to blow things up with his mind, nor is it hard to believe Soobin when he carries the same magical disposition with him. Something not too far off from Kai.

How he moves, how he talks about what he knows.

Pacifying, understanding. Reliable. 

Soobin doesn't look impressive physically, not by Yeonjun's standards. He doesn't look too sporty despite the height, carrying gangly limbs with an air of indifference on how he moves them. Doesn’t look like he works out. He has a pale complexion of someone who doesn’t go out that much. But there lies something deeper behind the lazy gazes and too-long limbs. An experience accumulated from uncommon knowledge, with which comes wisdom.

Soobin knows a lot about a lot of stuff, probably more than he lets on taking his career into account. Probably knows a lot more about Kai than Yeonjun himself. 

Suddenly, Yeonjun feels silly for being jealous ( _just a little_ bit) of Soobin. He’s Kai’s teacher after all, and Yeonjun has long since begun to understand that teenagers _will_ come not to like their parents much.

So when Soobin proposes taking Kai in for private lessons, Yeonjun doesn't think for too long. "Okay." 

Soobin gives him a reassuring smile. "It's going to be fine, I can tutor him how to control his gift. Teach him tricks here and there, all in a safe place,” he says. "I have done this before. Currently, I'm looking after two more kids in the same school, kids like him."

The sun is long gone, a murky black of the night sweeping every bit of orange off the sky. Kai is standing over at the court, looking pensively at them, twirling the ball in his hands.

“I do believe his mom’s death is a factor to this,” Soobin says, pursing his lips. “If it’s not too intrusive, it would help if I um, know about what is Kai going through. I-If that’s fine. I won’t insist if it’s too...”

Yeonjun cuts him off. “His mom died two years ago. They’re pretty close. Closer than Kai and I have ever been. He likes his mom better.” _They were divorced a year before that. His mom took custody._ Yeonjun has a feeling Soobin already knows that.

Kai dribbles the ball in the distance, keeps dribbling the ball in place. It sets a steady rhythm of unspoken yet pressing blame on Yeonjun for some reason.

Soobin hums again, licking ice cream off the tip of his fingers. Yeonjun doesn’t know _how_ he gets ice cream on his fingers when he’s eating off a cup but tries to resist the urge pull out his handkerchief and give it to him.

Kai poses to shoot and scores a three-pointer, the sound of the ring rattling fills the empty space. Yeonjun smiles a little. Kai might not like Yeonjun too much, but he undoubtedly got his basketball skills from him.

“Can I know where you live?”

“Hmm?”

“L-Like you know, for official business. Like a teacher to a parent. Kai wrote down his mom’s in the official forms the first time I asked.”

“Oh. Oh, okay.”

“You can have my number too.”

Yeonjun perks up and looks at him.

“Y-You know if you want to check up on him and if you have more questions.”

Soobin types in his number on Yeonjun’s phone and returns it to him with a smile. "You don’t have to worry about Kai, Mr. Choi. He's a bright kid." 

Yeonjun thinks that’s not how being a parent works. Constantly worrying is part of the job description, something you can never quit from even if you want to. Not that he wants to.

Yeonjun regrets a lot of things in his life. He regrets being a heavy drinker in his youth, regrets taking up ballet so late that he ended up spraining his ankle that led to him quitting dance altogether because it just wasn’t the same anymore. He regrets buying those cans of beer because he’s _not_ supposed to be drinking and Kai will surely scold him for this. He regrets eating less during dinner (because someone else paid) so now he’s hungry but there’s no food at home because he forgot to stock up grocery due to paperwork.

He regrets small, trivial choices. Reconcilable. Ones he can live with knowing he messed up. He doesn’t regret having Kai. Nor does he regret loving his mom that lead to having him.

He thanks the teacher and thinks he might think differently when he becomes a parent someday. Something about when you love someone _this_ much, you can never cease to worry about them even if there’s no reason to. 

_Tell me more about Kai._

Yeonjun’s finger hovers over the _Send_ button before he drops his phone onto his desk with a loud _bang._ He combs his fingers through his hair in frustration, which only reminds him of a haircut way overdue. Almost draping over the whole expanse of his nape after letting it grow. Mark had commented on his hair before, saying _it would look so dope if you let it grow as long as Hyunjin’s_ and he laughed at the suggestion. He could pull it off in his youth, sure, but he’s not so sure now. He hasn’t had a lot of time to stop for longer than two minutes to look at himself in the mirror. Or for a haircut. He hasn’t had a lot of time for anything nowadays.

And yet somehow he manages to debate with himself for almost five minutes, deleting and typing words to send to Kai’s teacher, Choi Soobin – which was saved as only “Soobin” on his phone - trying to come up with a better way to phrase his want to learn about his own son that wouldn’t hurt his pride so much.

 _Fuck it,_ his very plan of inquiry is hurting his pride so much. But it couldn’t completely cancel out his intense need to know. _But isn’t asking about it a sign of being a bad parent?_

Kai used to be a sweet, sweet boy. And very easy to please. Yeonjun remembers how he used to constantly seek his attention by shoving plushies to his face, asking him to play with him. How he used to have hundreds of plushie toys in his bed with him or how he likes being cuddled to sleep. Of course, Kai is a grown boy now. Yeonjun’s fine with him not shoving his face with plushies every now and then but seeing him act around Soobin reminds him of the sweet boy he once was with Yeonjun. Now, it’s like his mere existence irritates him.

It was the divorce. The external rip between the family that caused such tension within, tearing it bigger when his mom moved to another city with Kai in tow. Three years is a long time when you’re a parent away from your son, but Yeonjun felt like Kai has been away from him for much longer. It breaks his heart, even more so that he doesn’t know what to do, where to start pulling him back.

He needs help. Even if wanting help hurts his pride as a _father..._ can he do this? Soobin seems to be good with Kai, and Yeonjun bets, with any kid. Maybe he can help. Maybe he won’t judge.

He sighs, licking his lips. His pride is not worth his relationship with his son.

Yeonjun picks his phone up once again, staring at the screen intensely until his eyes sting and his vision blurs. _Okay._ He really needs glasses soon. He types out the safest text he can think of and sends it before he changes his mind, slamming his phone dramatically on his desk and burying his face in his hands.

That was probably one of the hardest things he has to do in his life.

“Ready for lunch?”

Yeonjun looks up to see Changbin peering into his office, raising his brows in question.

“Yeah, hold on a sec.” A message notification _pings_ on his lock screen. From Soobin.

“Great. We’re having intestines today. Mark knows a place.”

**_SOOBIN_ ** _  
Sure. Over lunch?_

“Oh, um. You go ahead, I have to be someplace else.” Yeonjun grabs his coat and his phone and heaves Changbin out of his office.

“What? Why? Where?” His friend looks scandalized. “Wait... You’re ditching Mark and I for a _date?”_

“Have fun having lunch on your own today!”

He leaves Changbin yelling after him, _“Hey! Don’t ditch us next time for your date!”_

Yeonjun scoffs under his breath, looking around for a cab outside his building. Soobin set their meeting place at a restaurant not too far from here and said he’s around the area so they might as well meet and talk about Kai.

If anything, it’s an official parent and teacher meeting, just outside school premises. It’s not a date.

Besides, Soobin is not his type.

“Hey, buddy.” Yeonjun puts the paper bags containing his groceries on the table, turning to Kai who’s crouched in front of his phone in the living room, preoccupied with some game.

Kai hums in response, veering to his right and letting out a groan when his character in his game died. Maybe. _What do kids play nowadays?_ Knowing would be pointless. He’s not much of a gamer even in his youth.

Yeonjun pulls out several tubs of ice cream. “Do you like some ice cream? I have mint chocolate.”

Kai perks up and gives him half of his attention, fingers still wildly tapping on his screen. “Yeah?”

“Yeah. I didn’t know what flavor you like. I just picked this by instinct.” _Well, that was bullshit but..._ “Do you like mint chocolate?”

His son is already padding from across the room and turning his phone off, poking at his paper bags for food. He eyes the tubs of mint chocolate ice cream with muted delight. “I like mint choco. It’s good.”

Kai sits down with a cup of ice cream and Yeonjun sits opposite of him, giving the ice cream a taste.

“Mmm.” He moans with bulging eyes. “This is so good? Better than expected.”

“Right?” Kai beams at him excitedly. “Taehyun thinks it tastes like toothpaste. He said, I might as well be eating toothpaste.”

Yeonjun shoves the thought that he doesn’t even know who Taehyun is away and laughs shakily, the minty, sugary sensation sticks to the back of his throat that he coughs a little.

“No, don’t laugh dad. Even Mr. Soobin thinks so.”

“Does he, now?” Yeonjun nods, pleased with this piece of information, childishly thinking he scored a point against Soobin for genuinely liking the flavor his son likes. Well, it’s natural isn’t it? Kai is _his_ son, after all. It’s a given they are bound to have the same taste in things.

“Well, I like it,” and under his breath, he mumbles, “Unlike your teacher.”

Kai doesn’t seem to hear it. “Right?”

Kai looks like a mad puppy asking for a quick pat on the head to soothe him. Yeonjun smiles at him and nods. “Yeah, it’s delicious. It’s better than any other ice cream flavor I ever tasted.”

“ _Exactly!_ Thank you?”

Later that night, Yeonjun sends a _Thank you, you were right_ text to Soobin.

He responds with, _About what? That your son likes mint choco or that you will like mint choco?_

_Both._

(“If you want to bond with your emotionally distant son, I suggest you start with things you have in common.”

Yeonjun squints at his unfinished tteokbokki, clasping at anything he can remember about his son’s likes and dislikes. Well, Kai likes games. And stuffed toys when he was young. And volleyball. He doesn’t like... the dark?

“But that’s obvious.” Soobin shrugs.

Yeonjun straightens up, suddenly self-conscious. “Yeah, of course.”

Soobin wipes his mouth with the back of his hand. Yeonjun reaches over the next table and places a box of tissues in front of him. The teacher gives him a shy smile and takes a few to wipe his mouth. “Do you have any plans for his birthday?”

Yeonjun pauses, humming under his breath. “I was thinking of taking him to an amusement park. Ride all the rides.”

“Mmm.” Soobin nods. “That’s good. Except your son is fifteen.”

Soobin gives him a look, Yeonjun fights back the urge to roll his eyes at him. “Okay, then what are you thinking?”

“A surprise birthday party.”

Yeonjun leans in and tilts his head. “Mr. Choi, my son is _fifteen.”_

This makes Soobin crack a smile. “Yes, but we leave him alone with his friends. It’s the best gift you can give your son at fifteen.”

 _Is it, really?_ Yeonjun keeps himself skeptical. “Okay then, I’m gonna throw him a surprise birthday party.”

“I have an idea.”

Of course, he has.

Yeonjun didn’t think he’d allow Soobin to talk about his own version of the Kai’s Birthday Party Plan throughout the entire lunch but he did, because he has surprisingly good ideas Yeonjun admits he couldn’t have come up on his own given how tight his work schedule is. Soobin seems to know more about party planning and already has a list of the Kai’s party attendees which are most kids one or two levels above him, and two from his class; his best friend Taehyun and Beomgyu. When he asked Soobin how he’s friends with kids older than him, Soobin tells him cryptically, “He likes to be babied.”

Even after he has said good bye to Soobin who’s heading back to school, he still couldn’t quite figure out what “to be babied” means and finds himself slightly annoyed because of this. He receives a text from Soobin five minutes after that, saying Kai likes mint chocolate ice cream and there’s a chance Yeonjun might like it too.

 _You can start with ice cream,_ Yeonjun hasn’t known Soobin for very long but he can already hear his voice in his head as he reads the text he sent five minutes later. _But you already know that._ )

One part of Soobin’s plan that Yeonjun didn’t know about is it is imperative that Kai has to be under the impression that his _own father_ forgot about his birthday, a piece of information supplied to him a day before the party. The plan was: while Kai thinks his father completely forgot about him, Taehyun is to take out Kai for the entire day while Soobin and Yeonjun prepare everything for the surprise party at home. He can’t say he was all for it, bidding his son good bye through gritted teeth as he pretended to head out to work without greeting him a Happy Birthday but Soobin assures a positive impact upon reveal and at the moment, Yeonjun could use all the positivity to his name.

After Kai has left with Taehyun, Soobin and Beomgyu appear on his doorstep with baking ingredients in hand. The teacher makes a beeline for Yeonjun’s kitchen, _Can I use your oven? Thanks!_ before setting down ingredients all over the kitchen counter like he owns the place. Yeonjun inspects the area, a pressing question rests uneasily on his tongue.

“Don’t you have other things to do, Mr. Choi?”

Beomgyu, who is already whipping eggs and flour in one bowl, inconspicuously slows his action to hear the conversation better.

Soobin sticks his head up from under the counter where he is pre-heating the oven. “Um, no. Not really. I promised Kai some cookies. You want to help?”

Yeonjun _did not_ expect that. But he does anyway, taking instructions from Soobin as he flings him from one task to another after it is done. Halfway through making the cookies, Soobin comes up with the brilliant idea to bake the cake himself so they did. Yeonjun helps of course, though he might argue that he did most of the work. Baking his son his birthday cake isn’t an activity he has done before, but finds strangely relaxing even without prerequisite knowledge about baking and relying solely on Soobin’s instructions and careful eye.

Throughout the process, Yeonjun has learned quite a few things from both Soobin and Beomgyu, who’s sporting a cute bowl cut and a motor mouth. He learns that Taehyun and Kai have been inseparable ever since late middle school, and being a new friend Beomgyu often feels like an intruder to their friendship. Soobin lightly reassures Beomgyu that isn’t the case, to which Beomgyu huffed, “You weren’t there when it feels like _I’m third-wheeling_ them” and Yeonjun has to laugh at the term the kid used.

From Beomgyu’s offhanded comment during tasting the freshly-baked cookies Yeonjun takes out of the oven, _“This is why everyone at school likes you Mr. Soobin. You bake really good cookies!”_ Yeonjun learns everyone at school likes Soobin and every year he works there, the students give him some sort of award for being the Most Likeable teacher around despite no such award existing before his service. Soobin laughs at the mention, telling the other adult to ignore it completely and jokingly tells him not to feel threatened.

Yeonjun learns about Kai’s plan on pursuing singing from Beomgyu.

Yeonjun learns about how Soobin learned baking and it’s through his very good friend Felix.

Yeonjun learns about how Beomgyu thinks Soobin and Felix look good together, and how Soobin thinks Beomgyu should worry about his balloons instead of dabbling with his love life.

Feeling bold, Yeonjun clears his throat and turns to Soobin. “Why don’t you invite your girlfriend over for the party later, Mr. Choi? I think we baked enough cookies for one more lady.”

“Oh, I don’t have a girlfriend,” Soobin says, smacking his lips. He’s cooking seaweed soup now, while Yeonjun chops up ingredients for a beef stew by his side.

“Oh,” Yeonjun replies. Then out of curiosity, “Boyfriend?”

“No boyfriend,” Soobin says. “I’m too busy at school for relationships. A little bit like you.”

Beomgyu coughs from the other end of the counter, mumbling a rather loud _Sorry_ for coughing and failing to retract a little mischievous grin on his face. Yeonjun pretends he doesn’t see it.

When dusk falls, Yeonjun’s living room is filled with kids reaching up to his height and singing the Happy Birthday song when the door flew open to reveal a very confused Kai and a grinning Taehyun. Yeonjun glides across the floor and gives Kai a big, tight hug and a whisper of “Happy Birthday, son” into his ear before the onslaught of his friends’ same greetings.

Kai tears up looking around and Yeonjun swears his heart swelled up a couple sizes.

Soon enough, the kids are stuffing their faces with cookies and cake and ice cream and pooling around Soobin like little moths to flame. Yeonjun stands at the edge of the life, sipping his soda peacefully looking at his laughing son from afar, full of life and youth. Wait, till he opens his gift for him...

Yeonjun inches close to Kai’s best friend Taehyun, holding his plate of cake. He nods at the kid who nods at him back, and takes a few tiny steps away from him.

“Hey, you’re Taehyun right? Kai’s best friend?”

“Yes sir,” comes Taehyun’s reply.

“So um...” Yeonjun clears his throat. “Did Kai cry when he thought he’s not having a party?”

Taehyun turns to him and looks at him dead in the eyes, lips pursed together. “Kai is _sixteen,_ sir.”

“No, I mean...” Yeonjun goes silent. “Oh...”

Taehyun bows at him and utters a quick, _Excuse me,_ before slipping away from the awkward little bubble Yeonjun enclosed them in and he _prays_ to all the gods above Taehyun doesn’t mention it to a single soul ever.

Soobin’s laugh reverberating all the way from the other side of room, as if on cue, feels like mockery to Yeonjun. He keeps his gaze transfixed on the teacher as he gulps down the remainder of his soda, confident that his covert staring will proceed unnoticed because of the distance.

It might’ve been the first time since he willingly admits to himself that Soobin’s dimples are his best facial feature yet, well, along with his squishy-looking cheeks that look soft to the touch. Soobin might not be built impressively for Yeonjun but he can’t fully deny his height is not doing him any good, sporting his freakishly long legs as he leans back on the counter with his arms crossed in front of the kids, chirping remarks he’s far too far away to hear what. Every time he does so, the students give some kind of exaggerated reaction, whooping and laughing and grinning at him. Including Kai. _Especially_ Kai.

It’s like Soobin has all of them bewitched. Yeonjun takes another gulp of his soda and tears his eyes off the scene.

A bewitchment where no one is safe.

Yeonjun gives his gift to his son after everyone has gone, smiling as he hands him a gift-wrapped box and insisting he opens it in front of him.

Kai does and holds up a silver band. When he looks up at his dad questioningly, Yeonjun explains, “I’ve been reading up on your ability because I want to understand it.”

When his son looks more confused, he presses on, “I understand that you can’t control it. And it poses as a danger to you and everyone around you. Fire is not a laughing matter, Kai. Fire takes lives. You understand that too, right?”

Yeonjun takes the silver band from Kai’s hand and clasps it around his wrist, patting his hand. “This silver band cancels out your ability. That way wouldn’t have to blow things up accidentally anymore. Isn’t it great?”

Yeonjun’s smile goes wider after he talks, expecting for same expression to surface on his son’s face.

Kai doesn’t smile at all.

The second time Kai blows up something, it’s at their own home and nearly chipped off a good portion of their kitchen. Yeonjun is so mad he drives Kai away and he doesn’t come home for a few days.

“You have to help me,” he breathes into his phone on the third day, hand clutched over his head. He doesn’t tell him about Kai running away the first two days because he’s not supposed to.

Kai is his son and _his_ responsibility alone, not his teacher’s. Not anyone else’s.

But after the third day’s sun rises, he finally admits to himself he can’t do this on his own. He was doing so well in the days leading up to that. Was it because he was mad at Kai for blowing up their house when the nullifying bracelet is right there? He could’ve hurt someone else with his outbursts of immense power. He could’ve hurt himself. He might not be hurt from the flames but what if the explosion he sets off rocks walls and foundations? What if one strong explosion buries him in the rubbles?

What is Yeonjun completely loses him to one explosion he knew he could’ve prevented?

He doesn’t want to think about it so he takes matters into his hands, finds out about the kind of magic Soobin talked of and tried to believe nullification is a real thing he could bestow upon his son. He couldn’t save him from his genes, no. But at least... he could do something about it.

He didn’t think it’d come to this. He didn’t think he’s far too estranged from his son all these time that he couldn’t figure out what he did wrong, what he shouldn’t have done. What he should do to bring him back.

There was only one person in the world who might know.

“Let’s clear your head first,” he says because he knows everything and Yeonjun believes him. “Let’s go for a walk. At the park in front of the school.”

“The band doesn’t work,” Soobin says, walking along the grass.

Yeonjun, who was pacing next to him with impatient steps, stops in his tracks. “What?”

“The first day Kai ran away, he went to me and showed me the silver band you gave him for his birthday,” Soobin says, shaking his head. “You were ripped off, Mr. Choi. There’s no such thing as a nullification instrument.”

“My son went to you?” Yeonjun asks urgently. “Where is he now? Is he okay?”

Soobin flashes him a pained expression, as if he’s holding back his mouth from spilling all their shared secrets until finally, he sighs in resignation and nods. “He’s fine. He’s been staying with me for the past few days. Please don’t give me that look, I’m not the enemy here.”

Yeonjun loosens his jaw and sighs, because as always, Soobin is right. Whatever’s going on here isn’t Soobin’s fault.

“It wasn’t that the band wasn’t magic that made Kai explode that day. No. In fact, he wouldn’t have if it weren’t for the band.”

Yeonjun furrows his brows. “What do you mean?”

The way Soobin looks at him makes Yeonjun feel like a child under scrutiny for a glaringly obvious mistake he has made that he has no idea of whatsoever. He has never felt tinier under someone’s gaze before.

“A few things, actually. For one, he thinks you’re trying to suppress who he is,” Soobin tells him. “He’s a magical child. Telling him to wear that band that cancels out a part of his identity doesn’t translate wondrously to the child, does it? The band doesn’t work, but what it represents and the fact that you gave it to him as a gift... aren’t those things enough to set him off?”

Somewhere at the back of his head, the rhythmic tap of the ball bouncing against the ground comes back to blame Yeonjun for being shortsighted. For being an asshole. For not being a good father.

Yeonjun remembers the first time he held Kai in his arms. His hands were shaking, his own voice inside his head telling him _You’re only 18, you’re only 18, you’re only 18, what are you gonna do now? You’re only 18._ Yeonjun was shaking, confused and scared. He’s plenty scared of what tomorrow brings. Couldn’t figure out what to do next, what would become of him. Of them. Of this little one, so fragile, so light and so innocent in his arms.

Kai’s soft coo shut the annoying voice in his head up.

When Kai grabbed his finger out of an infant’s reflex, Yeonjun cried. He was still scared, sure. But the brand new buzz crackling under his skin wasn’t the same brand of scared as he felt the moment he knew about Mina’s pregnancy. It wasn’t the same brand of scared as he felt when Mina’s water broke in the middle of the night and he could already see the crowning before he could call for a cab to take them to the hospital.

It wasn’t the same brand of scared when he got mugged on the first day he stepped in America, robbed of his wallet and phone but not of his drive and dreams.

Yeonjun later finds out, amidst his hazy and mildly hysterical tears, that the brand new buzz was excitement.

He plants a feather kiss on top of his son’s head and sniffed, swearing to all gods who’s watching over that he’d do everything for his child. Despite not being enough, despite being scared. Despite being an eighteen-year-old who’s barely got his life together and who’s now about to take care of another beautiful person for the rest of his life.

Yeonjun might’ve been buzzing with so much emotions at once but for once in his life, he felt truly ready to give his all.

“You mean well, Mr. Choi, but you have to listen to him. He needs you,” Soobin tells him in a soft voice. “More than anything. He needs you to be with him, to listen to him. To spend time with him. Ever since the divorce, he hasn’t truly felt like he had either of you.”

“But he has me... He’s always had me.”

_The first time Kai gripped his finger..._

“He needs to know.”

Yeonjun cries like he’s never cried before. Not in front of another person. But Soobin makes it easy.

"It's fine. It’s not too late.”

Yeonjun sniffles like a child, without meaning to. "Do you know you say that a lot?"

He is a grown man. Heck, he's pushing 34 in September. He's gotten way past the need to be reassured by a parental figure. His thoughts shrivel up though when Soobin visibly retracts from his remark, lips slightly parted with a look of disbelief rippling across his face.

"Out of habit, I guess. That's my job, after all.” Soobin strokes a strand of hair away from his face. Out of reflex, perhaps. Yeonjun waits for the shadow of regret to drift across Soobin’s face but it never comes. Instead, he is brimming with gentle affection, as if he’s looking at another one of his crying students who needs love. “Making sure everything is fine. Making everyone feel safe, feel welcome. Feel fine." 

Yeonjun scoffs, scraping for what remains of his dignity by acting bratty. "You're not on the job, you don't have to do that."

"Still," Soobin says, a dimple peeking through moisture in Yeonjun’s eyes. "You look like you need to hear it."

When Kai comes home, Yeonjun says his sorry and promises a lot of things. The tears he held back comes pouring when Kai hugs him midsentence, tugging at his shirt as if his life depends on it. Kai tells him he doesn’t have to promise him anything. He just needs to be there.

Yeonjun quits his job the next morning. He is about to get fired anyway for his consecutive absences without notice. Changbin packs his things for him and asks him if his new _significant other_ demands him to move to another city with them.

Yeonjun laughs because there isn’t really anyone and that he’s just sick and tired of a job that thinks it’s important enough to compete with his son.

Soobin presses a hand against Yeonjun's chest, his eyes fluttering close. Yeonjun could hear something strange throbbing under the layers. Not _strange,_ it isn't exactly foreign. Just something he hasn't felt in a long time, just a little outside the line of familiarity. Peering in, knocking at the boundaries. Smiling. Coaxing. Just as beautiful as it was when Yeonjun first knew it by the name Mina.

The hand is warm and gentle and sincere, he doesn't even know how he gathered all of that from a simple touch but Yeonjun does, looking up at Soobin. There's barely any difference in height, Yeonjun is pretty tall himself but the way this scene is unfolding before his very eyes, there might as well be.

Soobin radiates power, a calm yet noticeable presence, remarkable even from a mile away. And Yeonjun couldn’t help but look. 

"Oh!" He exclaims. 

Yeonjun lets go of the breath he doesn’t know he’s holding. "What, what?"

"I thought Kai got all of his magic from his mom," Soobin says, tapping his chest lightly. "I can sense a hint of magic from your bloodline as well. Fully fleshed out through Kai. Must've skipped your generation. How well would you take the news of your great, great grandparents possibly being magical beings?"

“Fine, I guess. I had a feeling they might’ve been witches.”

Soobin’s laugh tinkles like chimes. Like magic with sound. Maybe at this point, in this very moment, Yeonjun understands how Soobin enchants the kids. Just maybe.


End file.
